Grumbacher has stopped production of their Flake White Pre-Tested oil paint that is made from PW1 basic lead carbonate and PW4 zinc white. Grumbacher will re-introduce their Flake White which will still contain lead (PW1) in early 2010. This paint has already dried up on some art sites. Jerry’s no longer offers it and DickBlick is while supplies last.

gunzorro

09-21-2009, 09:50 PM

Weren't there problems with this paint? I thought I'd read either here, or another forum, of artists wanting to return unsatisfactory Flake White made by Grumbacher.

bjr001

09-22-2009, 03:45 PM

There were some people reporting problems with their Flake White going back some months. In particular that it wasn’t drying properly. Grumbacher (Chartpak, Inc.) mentioned they are upgrading the safety of their manufacturing of their Flake White in addition to acquiring a new source for the PW1 pigment. I’m glad Grumbacher is making a commitment to Flake White.

superstition

09-25-2009, 02:40 AM

I have had quite a few tubes of this, and the main fault is that it yellows quite a bit. Grumbacher's GEL medium also yellows quite a bit. It also isn't as opaque as the lead white I got from Astoria.

Of course, the other flake whites I've used were ground in lighter oils like walnut and safflower which makes the yellowing of Grumbacher seem a bit more reasonable. I particularly like W&N's Cremnitz White, but am not so sure about safflower's paint film.

sttaffy

09-25-2009, 10:33 PM

I've had some bad problems with this paint. Drying in the tubes, yellowing like crazy, smelling like rotten fish, never drying. I used to use it all the time, and just my luck, when I bought a bunch to stock up I got a really bad batch. They haven't returned my correspondence. This thread reminded me of it - I have 60 bucks worth of bad paint to return!

Marc Kingsland

09-25-2009, 11:25 PM

Of course, the other flake whites I've used were ground in lighter oils like walnut and safflower which makes the yellowing of Grumbacher seem a bit more reasonable. I particularly like W&N's Cremnitz White, but am not so sure about safflower's paint film.

W&N Cremnitz also gets my thumbs up.
It's much better than their Foundation white, which in my own tests not only went quite yellow, but also after a bit of aging became notably brittle.

sttaffy

09-26-2009, 01:40 PM

the yellowing I'm talking about was not due to their choice of mixing oil, and the slight yellow tinge that linseed oil tends to impart to a white paint. The paint itself turned markedly yellow - it looked like a 50/50 mix of yellow ochre and lead white. Naples yellow, almost.

WN cremnitz is nice, it's bright, too. I might start using this mixed 50/50 with their titanium for my all purpose white.

superstition

09-26-2009, 11:12 PM

I also noticed that strong yellowing from a paint swatch I made a long time ago. The other whites are positively angelic in comparison. But, only one of the others was ground in linseed, and it was cold-pressed and did also yellow quite a bit, although not as much as the Grumbacher.

I got a tube of Harding's Chinese Vermilion genuine a long time ago and the oil in it was brown and runny. The paint is so brownish it's almost like an iron oxide red. The rest of the paint I've gotten from Harding has been really good. Also, only that tube was marked "alkali refined linseed". The rest were cold pressed. Strange...

bjr001

09-27-2009, 08:24 PM

Grumbacher has changed their technical support contact apparently. In the past Grumbacher gave me an email address and toll free number to an individual that answered their tech questions. When I contacted Grumbacher regarding their Flake White recently, I used the old contact but was replied by a different email. Those of you that have had past problems and have not had your issues resolved may want to re-contact Grumbacher again.

Well, these tubes are very old, so I have no idea if there have been improvements. A friend did use a more recent tube recently and the color seemed to be OK. My friend, who uses Grumbacher, has never had drying problems but she paints alla prima (doesn't wait for layers to dry).